A stillbirth, meaning “quiet birth” occurs when a fetus which has died in the uterus or during labor or delivery exits a woman’s body. The term is often used in distinction to live birth or miscarriage. Most stillbirths occur in full term pregnancies.

Some sources reserve the term “stillbirth” for a fetus which has died after reaching mid-second trimester to full term gestational age. For example, in the United Kingdom, “stillbirth” is used to describe an infant delivered without life after 24 weeks gestation. The sources that use this definition tend to use the term “miscarriage” if the death occurs earlier in development. In contrast, other sources use the term “stillbirth” regardless of the stage of fetal development.

demogear gave a great answer. They are both horrible situations, and very difficult to get over. I had a miscarriage, and it still tugs at my heart. I think a still birth would be even harder to endure.

In my case the baby was surgically removed. I was in my fourth month. the whole experience was horrible. I went into early labor, and they told me there was nothing they could do to stop it. The mistreatment I got during that experience would make your skin crawl, so I won’t go any further into it.

It used to be that a woman wasn’t considered “pregnant” until she said that she was pregnant—and she could wait until way into the pregnancy if she wanted. Also, many woman would wait until they felt the baby move—“quickening”—before they would consider themselves pregnant. Andrew’s statistic is right: about 25% of pregnancies end in miscarriage. Most of those are because something is the matter with the fetus—but there are other reasons also.

What is the difference between a miscarriage or pre-term labor?
Lets say your 22 weeks pregnant your bleeding very bad give birth to a baby that survives in a incubator. It that called pre-term labor or a miscarriage because when your in labor you do not bleed bad but when you have a miscarriage then you bleed.